May 20, 2019<\/p>\n
I have returned from a writer\u2019s conference, one of several I attend each year. Writers, like artists and poets and few others, are obliged to be hermits. We wear our hearts and lives and fears and joys on our sleeves; but require solitude to work. It seems an odd thing for fragile creative spirits ultimately to toss their precious babies, so to speak, for the world to seize upon\u2026 maybe criticize\u2026 or, maybe worst, reject. Or ignore.<\/p>\n
Yet we do it because we must. I think (without being presumptuous) that the closest we can get to understanding the essence of God is to create. In a sense, as we are to be spiritual \u201cimitators of Christ,\u201d we can savor the Creator by being creative too. Besides, it is His fault since He put the creative spark in us! Seriously, if He has gifted some with creative gifts as He apportions other gifts to other people as He wills, writers, artists, poets, performers, and other creative people have special responsibilities to touch the world\u2026 and translate the myriad aspects of God to others.<\/p>\n
I will reaffirm some of the thoughts I had last year at another conference. The recent confab\u00a0was the wonderful Write His Answer conference annually organized by Marlene Bagnull in Estes Park, Colorado. I was one of several speakers, conducting a couple of classes, and meeting a lot of great new friends. I also was reacquainted with some old friends.<\/p>\n
It was attended by a couple hundred people, a majority of whom are aspiring writers, and many who had published a book or books or some blogs, still looking for tips to advance further.<\/p>\n
When you want to write, you write. In fact, you need<\/em> to write. And write. And read and write. It\u2019s what you do because you are God-wired that way. I often heard people before and after classes, in the auditorium and lunchroom, in hallways: \u201cDid you read what I wrote since last year?\u201d or \u201cHave you read my book?\u201d<\/p>\n Never boasting, these questions were asked by people from nervousness or justifiable pride, and every writer\u2019s sub-textual intention \u2013 hoping that people notice and understand your message; touched, maybe changed, by what you have to say, how you write His answer.<\/p>\n It always strikes me that the frequent question \u2013 \u201cHave you read my book?\u201d \u2013 might indeed have been the de facto<\/em> theme. \u201cUp above our heads\u201d; all around us; and a part of everything we did, everything to which we dedicate our careers. But in a very real sense, God Himself also asks, \u201cHave you read My Book?\u201d<\/p>\n He asks that every day.<\/p>\n He asks us, not to read the Bible every moment of every day, but some time during every day, as many of us do. A passage, a chapter, a book, a verse. It is not an unreasonable request \u2013 but a request is inherent in the question \u2013 as God\u2019s admonitions never are unreasonable.<\/p>\n The Bible is what we know of God. Yes, there is nature \u2013 I know well enough from our mountaintop experiences in Colorado. Agnostics who pose, and Christians who are lazy, can say that they can know God from communing with nature.<\/p>\n Wrong. That is one of the ways we can see God, even feel<\/em> Him. But to know<\/em> Him, we must read His book.<\/p>\n He meant it to be so. We have the Ten Commandments\u2026 written. We have Jesus\u2019s teachings\u2026 recorded and written and published. I recommend visiting the Museum of the Bible in Washington DC. I saw its substantial portions when it was on tour (in Colorado a few years ago!), and a lesson for believers and skeptics alike is that, for the hundreds and hundreds of texts from different countries, different scribes, different languages, different centuries, the texts of the Holy Scriptures vary hardly at all. The Holy Spirit \u201cdictated\u201d to the hearts of many writers, and oversaw the consistency of God\u2019s Words.<\/p>\n Words.<\/p>\n Jesus communicated God\u2019s love for us. And words, books, scripture, communicate Jesus to us.<\/p>\n The Bible says we are to \u201chide the Word in our hearts.\u201d How better than through study of those words? They are precious. I shared with an attendee at the conference that, even when I read a Bible passage for maybe the hundredth time, some new revelation dawns on my heart. One speaker this year, Ava Pennington, delivered a powerful message that made we weep. She used phrases, and cited truisms, that I have heard all my life. But when we write or speak, and organize thoughts, the old can become new; and the new become newer. The wonder of words.<\/p>\n How much Bible reading is proper? Have things turned irrelevant? The Bible’s first history lesson reminds us, \u201cIn the beginning was the Word; and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.\u201d Are some passages obsolete? II Timothy 3:16 tells us, \u201cAll scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness.\u201d A beloved old hymn states, \u201cI love to tell the Story\u2026 \u2018twill be my theme in Glory.\u201d<\/p>\n Have you read His book lately?<\/p>\n + + +<\/p>\n Stephen Hill (1956-2012) was a Baptist preacher and session singer before he launched his own gospel-music career. This is a song he sang when he and Woody Wright were invited to perform in the Netherlands. A moving song; you will be impacted in spite of the overlapping Dutch and Norwegian subtitles (he was very popular in Europe). Words!<\/p>\n